Creepy Crimes and Creepy Panties

Oh hey there, nice to see you hear on another Frida Friday!

This week I went to my internship three times (Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday). Each day became more eventful that I guess I forgot what happened for the majority of the first two days...

Don't worry though, what I can remember is quite scandalous. In fact, the reason I came in on an extra day was because there was an important parole hearing where an attorney from the County Attorney's office would be there to support the victim's side.

Tuesday (3/28/2017)

On this day, I only fully remember one parole hearing that took place. This was a hearing for one of two brothers who at the the age of 19, beat, raped, and killed a women at a bar. These two brothers slit the young woman's neck all the way through to the spine after raping and beating her multiple times. I believe the brother received a harsher sentence of either life without a chance of parole or the death penalty. The inmate tried to convey to the board that he had changed and found God, and so on, however, while in prison he had countless amounts of infractions, major and minor, along with being in the Old Mexican Mafia. Clearly this type of behavior would leave anyone a bit unsettled to let him out of prison. To further assure that he not be released, a victim advocate spoke on behalf of the victim's mother by relaying  to the board the telephonic conversation she had with the mother. I guess one of the board members did not agree with that kind of delivery and started focusing and talking about that to the advocate instead of the actual case. (personally, it didn't really seem like the right time to discuss that, but moving on..) Next, the attorney spoke and took the case home; the inmate was denied parole..

On an unrelated note, I have noticed that the board tends to use the inmate's history prior to the current conviction as some sort of depiction of their current state instead of mainly focusing on what an inmate does while in prison. I have also noticed that the board rarely takes into account circumstances and situations in which people are placed in... Where does nurture v. nature come into play? I don't know these are just a few speculations...

Wednesday (3/29/2017)

It was all such a blur...

Thursday (3/30/2017)

What an intense day to say the least... It started off with a parole hearing for a man who was already on home arrest. He appeared to be doing great on home arrest but the board thought that six months was too little time to determine whether he should be put on general parole or not. 

After that hearing, a complete discharge hearing was supposed to take place, however, it was found out that the man had committed a crime while on parole and never told his parole officer and fully completed the probation for the new charge under a different name. Because of that, he got arrested (i witnessed it!) outside the court room.

Once all of that was settled and lunch had taken place, there was another total discharge hearing that would take place. This man was released on parole and was seeking complete discharge from the state so he could "travel" for work. (he was a subway employee, you should be able to see the irony soon). He was convicted for several rapes in the early '70s in which he would wear women's panties and aggressively rape young girls.  As of recently, he had many violations for being in contact with young children and for having sexual conversations on the internet (sexting himself cross-dressed) while on parole. This was definitely alarming since it was a similar pattern to his original crime(s) which only shows that he needs someone watching him (at least in terms of parole).  It was kind of funny that his subway boss was there to advocate for him because he ended up making himself not look so good as it came up that he allowed this man to be a general manager to employees as young as 16... creepy... 

What really had me unsettled was seeing one of his victims there having to relive her horrid experience from when she was just 14 years old, only to further show the board that this man is too perverted to be completely discharged... That woman's strength is inspiring; I do not know if I could be in the same room as my rapist like she was forced to do...

Thank you all for reading, and  don't forget to let me know your thoughts!

Frida 

Injustice in Justice

Hello World!

It is Frida Friday which means time for a new update on my blog. Thank you all for tuning back in, it's  much appreciated...

Wow. this week truly opened my eyes as to what the victims experience is truly like within the criminal justice system. Never before had I witnessed firsthand such questionable decisions made at the expense of potentially the general public, but more on that later... ( I want to dissect my week day by day if that makes any sense)

Wednesday (3/22/2017)

The day started with the typical victim-letter mailing and other administrative work which I have come to enjoy. Upon arriving though, I was notified that some sort of media crew would be coming later that day for some clips because the Victim Services had won some sort of award that will be awarded on April 3rd officially. I didn't think much of it since I didn't think I would be a part of the filming, but they wanted me to play the victim for a quick clip. Let me just say I don't think that Hollywood is in my near future, but hey it was fun.

Once all of that was over, I had to recount over 2000 ribbons for Victim's Rights Week because the inmates at Perryville Prison apparently aren't that great at counting (at least those who had to count/make the ribbons, then again there were 2000 and I too had trouble). It was hard, but you gotta do what you gotta do as they say.

Thursday (3/23/2017)

On thursday I was hit with a dose of reality. As excited as I was to see what the parole hearings are like, never did I imagine the intensity involved with each hearing.

The first parole hearing involved many parties, the victims family, a different victim's letter, the inmate, the inmate's mother, and the Arizona Justice Project (and obviously the Board of Executive Clemency).  The inmate was sentenced 25 years to life (with a chance of parole) for murder in the first degree. At the young age of 17, the inmate and two other friends would attempt to hitchhike and then eventually would end up killing the driver. What is especially interesting is that this was not their first time doing this.
 In fact,  they had been suspected of doing this similar crime along the same highway in Texas, but there wasn't enough concrete evidence. Also, all of their supposed victims had been killed (and died) except for one who somehow survived being stabbed 13 times. (this was the victim that wrote the letter to the board). Personally, after hearing this backstory, along with hearing about his initial psych evaluation where he mentioned having killing thoughts, and lets not forgot the testimony from the murdered victim's parents, I wouldn't let him out.
Fortunately enough for him though, the Arizona Justice Project, a legal and support team made up of ASU law students whose goal is to help certain inmates pro-bono). The board seemed to be very intrigued by this group. To me it seemed that this made the board members want to let him out because he had this extensive "support system."
When the inmate had a chance to speak, his main  focus was to show how well he had done in prison, not receiving violations, taking many classes, teaching classes, etc. In the prison, he was an example to follow. If I am being honest, I do not feel that life in prison and life in the real world are comparable whatsoever. There is much more of a sense of freedom and leeway when one as out; life is more gray than clear cut, but in prison, it seems like the lines are more defined since one is under 24/7 supervision.
Back to the case. From my perspective, the inmate kept dismissing what he had done "he was young", and then would move directly back to showing all of his accomplishments, almost treating this hearing like a job interview which is pretty ironic since he taught job-interview classes which would only add to the irony since he had never had a real job being locked up at 17.
What really got to me was that this man at 40 some years old, mature enough to understand the severity of his actions, was not fazed at all, throughout the entire hearing he maintained a stoic demeanor showing no remorse, and continuously blaming his actions on others and his age. I don't know about any of you but as a 17 year old myself, my idea of hanging out with my friends does not involve hijacking cars and murdering their owners. There really is no justification for murder. especially if it was not accidental. I am a firm believer in second chances, however to me, there is a difference with wanting to change your life and not recognizing the severity of your actions.

Now obviously the board decided to release him, although I disagree,  I hope he will behave while on parole, and is on the road to changing his life...

Apart from this hearing, I also had the chance to observe another one that definitely had me feeling some type of way to say the least.

This next hearing involved a man who had accidentally murdered someone and was sentenced to 25 years to life for first degree murder even though it was accidental. This inmate had formally requested an official translator (which is in the realms of his rights as an inmate), and instead, the board did not provide any sort of translator they just asked the CO on duty to translate last minute because he was hispanic. Unfortunately, this led to poor translation at the expense of the inmate. Although this inmate had a plan once he'd be released, it was not adequately portrayed by the CO,  and the board was not fully aware on what the inmate's plans were. Also, this parole hearing kind of took the turn for the worst when the board members found out that he was an undocumented immigrant; things became a bit more political in my opinion. One board member went on a rant on how this inmate does not respect the law of the land because he had illegally crossed over 30+ years ago, it seemed as though she was more enraged by his legality as opposed to the actual crime at hand. Now this inmate already had an ICE detainer, and had expressed his desire to return to Mexico, so if I was the one who was so irritated by "his lack of respect for the country", I would have had him released so he'd then be deported so tax dollars wouldn't have been "wasted" on his care in prison. But I guess the board had different plans.

Anyways, this week has really opened my eyes to seeing the injustices that exist on both sides of the
 criminal justice system.

Thanks for reading.

-Frida

Back to Business

Hello Everyone!

Welcome back to another week and another Frida Friday on my blog.

This week I got the opportunity to see yet another side of how Victim Services works to facilitate a victim's experience within the criminal justice system in Arizona. On Wednesday, I  was allowed to attend a meeting in which individuals from other government agencies across Arizona came together to discuss different plans or forms of advocacy that would alleviate many problems victims face in the criminal justice system.  In this meeting, I was able to see how different agencies work together for a specific cause. For instance, different presentations were presented and updates were given to show the legislation and work that has been accomplished these past few months (these meetings happen every few months for these purposes).

After that meeting, I observed another one. This meeting had to do with organizing different training events to train people across all agencies so that they would be informed on the effects that different crimes can have on victims. Personally, I found this very important because I too believe that people should be taught how much impact domestic violence, sexual harassment, and other serious crimes can have on a person's life. This is definitely a huge way to inform others on what a victim goes through and it is crucial to not leave them in the dark so to speak.

Once all of the meetings were over, I worked more on letter sending and the excel stat spreadsheet that I had worked on in week 4. I actually really enjoy entering the stats into the spreadsheet even if it is long and tedious. In terms of revocation hearings, I did not see many this week, but Parole hearings are actually starting up next week, and don't worry, these will definitely give me a chance to tell a few interesting stories so my blog won't be so dry if you know what I mean.

So that is pretty much all that happened to me on-site this week. Get excited for next week's post for sure, there may or may not be something super cool in it.

Anyways, as always thanks for reading.

Peace.

- Frida

SPRING BREAK!

Behind the Scenes

Hey there, Welcome back to another Frida Friday!  I bet you are all on the edge of your seats waiting to read about what happened this week during my internship, I know I would be...

I know some of you are going to be quite surprised but this week I did not sit in and observe a single revocation hearing. For me, week 4 was more consumed with the administrative side of the internship. I helped with the victim notification process along with other things that I will get into.

'What is this notification process?', you may be wondering. Basically, the Victim Services has a data base in which they keep all the information of the victims and of the inmates in prison. Because the job of the Victim Services is to provide a sort of support and representation for victims, the advocates notify the victims when the inmate will be released on parole or released indefinitely, or if the inmate has any upcoming hearings, etc. This is usually done with a letter in the mail and/or a phone call. In the envelope, they include the letter (obviously), a paper defining the different types of releases, a survey, and a brochure (this all depends on what is going on with the inmate). Unfortunately, I cannot assist in the letter writing process since I can't have access to the database because of my age, but I was able to put the letters together and mail them out (I mailed 20+) as well as put the labels on the return envelopes.

Making Stacks

Stacks on Stacks

I also spent a good chunk of my time filling out the statistics of how many victims called in this month on an excel spreadsheet. Although this was quite time consuming, I liked being able to help in that way. I am not sure how much detail I can give away on the stats so I'll just leave you all with that bit of information.

Lastly, I just wanted to mention that this upcoming week I will be on my spring break (like some of you) in Mexico, I'm not sure if I'm going to make a post or not so stay tuned for that... 

Also, I noticed that you may not be receiving a notification for when I reply to your comments so please look out for that because I do not want to leave any of you confused or with any questions.

Thank you all so much for coming back to my blog!

See you soon.

- Frida